


Tough Lover

by orphan_account



Category: RuPaul's Drag Race RPF
Genre: Burlesque, M/M, Songfic, repost of old work, tw alcohol, tw panic attack mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-23
Updated: 2020-03-23
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:26:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23277805
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: If this is the last thing I am going to remember, so be it.
Relationships: Brooke Lynn Hytes/Vanessa Vanjie Mateo, branjie - Relationship
Kudos: 1





	Tough Lover

**Author's Note:**

> It's me again reposting another old work. Enjoy this songfic to Bound To You from the movie Burlesque.  
> Leave me a like if you enjoyed, it would mean the world xx

_ I’ve opened up unsure I can trust _

_ My heart and I were buried in dust _

I am scared. I don’t understand these feelings and I don’t know how they can be of any use to me. This is foreign to me and I wish I had stuck to my roots, had never got onto the plane and ended up  _ here _ . My heart flutters like the butterflies I model myself on when I float through the air, mid grand jet é,  whenever you so much as walk past me. There are vines crawling up my throat and I pray with all my heart that they do not start to blossom, for I do not know how I would cope with that.  The feeling of stomach acid rising from the pit of my stomach is not one I am unfamiliar with; for I have had my fair share of dizzying panic attacks on opening nights, scabbed knees resting volatilely on my chest whilst I attempt to settle the rattle of my breath catching on the sharp edges of my ribs. But there is no crowd waiting for my debut, nor is there a panel of judges watching every move my aching body makes.

It is just you, and me, and somehow that is worse.

_ You’re all I need when I’m holding you tight _

_ If you walk away I will suffer tonight _

I held your hand on Wednesday night after one too many tequilas, but I remember every moment of it in hazy sharpness like I imagine the flashbacks you’re supposed to see before you die. They have been treasured and cherished for god knows how long, so some of the details aren’t as clear as they were thirty years ago, but they still make me smile.

If this is the last thing I am going to remember, then so be it.

_ I found a man I can trust _

_ And boy, I believe in us _

I still don’t understand these feelings, and you kissing me on the tour bus couch at 2 am certainly doesn’t make them any easier to decipher. Sure, we were both drunk (vodka, this time) and I was spilling feelings and emotions and secrets like fucking Niagara Falls. I am still scared, but there’s a flicker of hope that passes through your eyes like a candle in the wind, and I do not want to be the one that has to blow it out.

I shall keep it lit forever, if you want me to.

_ I am terrified to love for the first time _

_ Can’t you see that I’m bound in chains? _

Everybody knows that I am a novice of this craft. I find it hauntingly familiar, the feeling of being fourteen years old; a closeted teenager in a dance studio surrounded by pretty girls in pink tutus is still deeply embedded within my soul. I pray that I will one day grow into a caring and compassionate, spontaneous and sweet husband, but I’ve got to lace up the ballet slippers before I can twirl. I don’t know a lot about love or relationships but I do what persistence, dedication and a fuck ton of sleepless nights spent practising footwork can do for a person and their career. I hope that the same logic will work for this. But then again, I was young and fearless back then with a burning desire to build my body with strength and talent. I know I need to pull myself together but there are chains interlinked with my veins and they are dragging me down.

I think I am going with them.

_ So much, so young, I faced on my own _

_ Walls I built up, became my home _

I am fiercely independent, always have been. It has nothing to do with a poor childhood, a harrowing loss or a divorce. More so my own goddamn stubbornness. The chains in my veins have twisted into a labyrinth of confusion and emotion that is running through my blood and I doubt even the strongest prisoner could find an escape. It is on days like this that I wish I could start again, knowing what I’d do differently this time. I wouldn’t run away from the short blonde boy who kissed me behind a tatted curtain in some dressing room in New York when I was twenty one years old, hope for a sweet high school-like romance. I’d remind myself to put people’s numbers into my smartphone and to call the ones most dear to my heart once a week. I hope I would learn to be open, to cry on my mom’s shoulder after coming out to my classmates, to let people in.

Sometimes, when the bus journey from Las Vegas to some city in Arizona feels like it’s never going to end, I do find myself wondering where my life would’ve gone if I had never gone to that first dance class, hadn’t put every ounce of heart and soul into it. Would I be married, with children and a job with a steady income? I think I’d probably be a hairdresser or a teacher, something to do with kids for sure.

Maybe I need to stop thinking about it.

Maybe all I need is right in front of me.

_ I’m strong and I’m sure there’s a fire in us _

You are a burning inferno of impulsivity and mania and you are everything I am not. I don’t like to make such a simple comparison but I’m more like the water. There is a certain stability, for sure, in that the tide on the beach is as sure to lap at the shore as it is to withdraw back. It is calm and that is also true, for I am a master of not showing  _ anything _ until it is  _ everything _ . For you cannot distinguish when the water is relaxed or happy or excited but  _ god _ can you tell when it gets angry. Maybe that is where we meet, at the very centre of the tsunami. We could cause serious destruction, but only if we chose to, as I think we meet on the other end of the spectrum also. Not when the blaze has turned treasured possessions into nothing more than ash, but more like a coal fireplace in the centre of a family sitting room. You flicker absentmindedly with a clear intention, you are soft with a purpose and I think I prefer us like that. That would probably mean I am a backyard swimming pool and whilst I can’t think of any metaphors that can compare the two when I am in this state of mind, I know they go together.

I know we go together.

_ Suddenly the moments here _

_ I embrace my fears _

_ Do I risk it all? _

_ Come this far just to fall, fall _

It is just before six in the morning in Stockholm when I allow myself to  _ feel _ . The world is falling into place right in front of my glistening eyes and I know I need to wipe these tears and go get my man before the sun rises and I lose all of this confidence. I know I want you like I know I want Swiss Chalet and cat cuddles and reality television. You are burning your way through my soul, integrating yourself into my dreams and my visions and my fantasies and that is how I know I need you. There are moments where I falter, stumble backwards with those damn thoughts swirling round in my head. But then I remember, that I am the ocean. That I can be the solution to lots of things, fire included. I cannot drown myself. 

I will not drown myself.

_ And finally found my way _

_ I am bound to you _


End file.
